It has recently been argued that the new B-theory of time argues invalidly from the claim that tensed sentences have tenseless truth-conditions to the conclusion that temporal reality is tenseless. But while early B-theorists may have relied on some such inference, new B-theorists do not. Giving tenseless truth-conditions for tensed sentences is not intended to prove that temporal reality is tenseless. Rather it is intended to undermine the A-theorist's move from claims about the irreducibility of tensed language to the conclusion that temporal reality must be tensed. I examine how A-theorists have used facts about language in attempting to establish their conclusions about the nature of temporal reality. I take the recent work of William Lane Craig, and argue that he moves illicitly from facts about temporal language to his conclusion that temporal reality is tensed.

There are two extant versions of the new tenseless theory of time: the date version and the token-reflexive version. I ask whether they are equivalent, and if not, which of them is to be preferred. I argue that they are not equivalent, that the date version is unsatisfactory, and that the token-reflexive version is correct. I defend the token-reflexive version against a string of objections from Quentin Smith. My defence involves a discussion of the ontological and semantic significance of truth conditions, and of the connection between truth and reality on the one hand, and that between truth and meaning on the other. I argue that Smith''s objections to the token-reflexive theory stem from his confusing these two aspects of the notion of truth.

The debate about the reality of tense descends from an argument of McTaggart's,whichwas designed to prove the unreality of time.The argument has two constituent theses: firstly that time is intrinsically tensed, and secondly, that the notion of tense is inherently self-contradictory. If both of these theses are true, it follows that time does not exist. The debate that has emerged from this argument centres around the truth or falsity of each of these theses. A-theorists accept the first and reject the second thesis, drawing the conclusion that, since there is no contradiction in the notion of tense, time exists and is intrinsically tensed. B-theorists accept the second and reject the first thesis, concluding that the notion of tense is inherently self-contradictory, but since time is not intrinsically tensed, time exists and is tenseless. I think the argument against tense is sound, but time is not intrinsically tensed, so time exists and is tenseless. However, this argument, which has come to be known as McTaggart's paradox, is obscure, which has tended to blunt its force. In this paper I recast McTaggart's paradox in my own terms. The notion of tense has two components: an observer-independent distinction between past, present and future, and a flow of time. Totake tense seriously is to suppose that these two features of tense are also features of time. I argue that they are inherently incompatible with each other, generating a contradiction at the heart of the notion of tense, thus proving that tense is unreal. The contradiction arises no matter how one construes the notion of tense, and I illustrate this by revealing essentially the same contradiction in a number of different accounts of tensed time.

Analyzes the concept of four-dimensionalism which holds that a physical object exhibiting identity across time is a four-dimensional whole composed of briefer four-dimensional objects or temporal parts. Arguments presented by philosopher Peter van Inwagen to refute the theory of four-dimensionalism; Weaknesses of Inwagen's arguments.

In debates over the existence and nature of social kinds such as `race' and `gender', philosophers often rely heavily on our intuitions about the nature of the kind. Following this strategy, philosophers often reject social constructionist analyses, suggesting that they change rather than capture the meaning of the kind terms. However, given that social constructionists are often trying to debunk our ordinary (and ideology-ridden?) understandings of social kinds, it is not surprising that their analyses are counterintuitive. This article argues that externalist insights from the critique of the analytic/synthetic distinction can be extended to justify social constructionist analyses.

The first part of this article deals with descartes' ambivalent treatment of ideas--sometimes as mental acts, sometimes as mediating objects in the mind. The problem arises, it is suggested, because of a running together of what are two distinct strands in aquinas' account of mind. In the second part, descartes' account is examined from the standpoint of a modern concept of intentionality--leading to some general conclusions about the nature of thoughts.

This is an examination of the relation of mental causation and behavioral effects. The author focuses on the role that consciousness plays in determining whether a given effect is to be assigned a mental cause. Consciousness is to be thought of as (1) the definitional criterion for a thing's being mental and therefore a "mental cause," (2) the false idea that consciousness is a kind of extra sense which certifies a given experience, and (3) a link in the causal chain.